Taras Kuzio’s Blog

What Kind of Advice Would You Give the President?

What should a president do when he has 4.1% popularity and his political force, Our Ukraine, only 1.8? The Arseniy Yatseniuk and Leonid Chernovetsky blocs have only 2.3 and 0.2% respectively. These are the latest poll figures from the respected Kyiv International Institute for Sociology published in a weekly newspaper.

What advice would you give the president if you were a senior adviser or the head of the presidential secretariat?

Would you call upon him to resign and call early presidential elections because he had obviously lost the support of Ukrainians? Perhaps there is a need to revise the constitution so that if support for the president drops below 10% and remains there for more than one year that he should resign.
Would you advise the president to continue to press for early parliamentary elections believing that his allies will gain more seats in parliament than they currently have? Pro-Yushchenko forces will have fewer seats in a new parliament making the presidents support for early elections incomprehensible to everybody. Why does the president believe that Vyacheslav Kyrylenko and Viktor Baloga, who head political projects (Our Ukraine and United Centre) that have 1.8 and 0.1% percent support, will save his presidency?

Would you advise the president to continue to not take the global financial crisis into account in his
dealings with parliament, government and political forces? Would you advise the president that he can use his handling of the crisis through the National Security and Defence Council to improve his ratings in order to win a second term?

A senior US-based analyst and business consultant who works on Ukraine and has been a loyal Yushchenko supporter until recently told me, ‘Ukrainian voters have written him off and trying to revive one’s image at this late stage will not work as voters will ask ‘Where have you been in the last four years’’. The consultant believed that, ‘there is nothing the president can do to be re-elected’ as at best he can only improve his ratings to 12-15%.

Would you advise the president to keep the same “manager” in place as the head of your secretariat whose strategy has reduced his support, undermined the orange coalition, produced Yushchenko fatigue in the West and destroyed his chances of being re-elected? Would you advise the president that Viktor Baloga is undertaking a good or bad management of the secretariat over the last two years?

Would you congratulate the president on his success in pushing Ukraine closer to NATO membership? Ukraine will not receive a Membership Action Plan (MAP) in December, because of pre-term elections, or in April 2009, as it will be unclear if a new government is in place by that time. NATO membership will also not be raised by presidential candidates in the 2009 elections because it is unpopular among Ukrainians.

Would you have the courage to explain to the president that Ukraine’s progress towards NATO membership will therefore be dependent on that damned woman you seem to hate so much, Yulia Tymoshenko, and whether she achieves an election victory in January 2010. If you have the courage to do so you should also inform the president that he has no possibility of being re-elected for a second term and that an election victory by Viktor Yanukovych would bury Ukraine’s NATO membership.

So, well done Mr. President! It will be your public enemy and the cause of so much of your sleepless nights – Tymoshenko – upon whom progress in Ukraine’s NATO membership will rest. Only she can win a second round election against Yanukovych.

At a recent government seminar on Ukraine that I attended Stephen Larrabee, chair in European Security at the RAND Corporation think tank, blamed, ‘Yushchenko for undermining Ukraine’s integration into the West’. Larrabee is a supporter of Ukraine’s NATO membership. A former US Ambassador to Ukraine who did not ant to be quoted told the same seminar that, ‘Yushchenko made the Ukraine’s chance of achieving a NATO MAP in December zero on October 8’, that is the day he disbanded parliament.

A courageous and patriotic adviser needs to ask the president why he is determined to take Ukraine on a kamikaze flight over the edge and whether he has a moral right to play with the lives of 48 million Ukrainians?

What would you therefore advise him to do?

If I were a senior presidential adviser I would advise him that with only 4% support he should do the only honorable step a man can do; namely, resign.